Serious benefits - Citizens Advice

Introduction
Inside...
“The work done by Citizens Advice Bureaux in benefit take-up is
absolutely invaluable. However much we try to make things
simple, it’s in the nature of benefit rules that there are some
complexities and it’s important that people are helped through
them. Sometimes if they’ve got cause to complain against us,
then it’s right that there is someone independent to represent
them.” Andrew Smith, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Since the inception of the
welfare state, Citizens Advice
Bureaux have been helping
people to get the benefits and
assistance to which they are
entitled and in 2001-02, CAB
advisers helped with over
1.6 million benefit and tax
credit problems.
Benefit take-up campaigns
are run by many Citizens Advice
Bureaux, targeting sections of
the community who are failing
to claim what is rightly theirs,
including elderly people, people
with disabilities and low-income
families.
People over 75 are the largest
group not to claim their
entitlements, despite antipoverty
measures, such as the
minimum income guarantee
(MIG), designed to benefit the
two million pensioners who live
in poverty.
A National Audit Office*
report estimated that a third of
those entitled to MIG did not
claim it. This jumped to a
possible two-thirds for some
other benefits. The stigma of
claiming by a generation
brought up to ‘make do and
mend’ is great. Long,
complicated forms and a
confusing claims process are also
big barriers.
The effect of not claiming
entitlements can be profound.
It can mean scraping by on an
unnecessarily low income,
struggling to afford to pay
for basics.
The reorganisation of the
benefits system and emphasis on
means-testing, makes the takeup
work of Citizens Advice
Bureaux all the more vital.
Serious benefits looks at that
work, the keys to success, the
partnerships that succeed and
the people who gain.
There is much to be proud of.
Estimates are that some CAB
benefit take-up campaigns net
as much as £85 for claimants for
each £1 spent on running them
– money which helps lift that
person out of poverty and
benefits the community in
which it is spent.
It’s not just claimants who
gain from CAB benefit take-up
work. For each local person
claiming a particular benefit
(capped at a certain level), the
local authority receives a set
amount of extra cash from the
Government. This can bring in
many thousands of pounds for
the local authority.
We discuss the importance of
securing on-going funding and
look at some of the innovative
one-off projects and strong
partnerships that have achieved
exciting results.
And we ask the Secretary of
State for Work and Pensions,
about government initiatives to
increase claiming and the value
of Citizens Advice Bureaux work.
4 CAB research shows how
benefit take-up work can
radically improve the lives
of older people who are
under-claiming their
entitlements.
6 Targeting, home-visiting
and ongoing support are
key to improving benefit
take-up amongst hard-toreach
groups.
8 Good advice is good for
your health.
10 Why pooling resources and
sharing experience across
agencies is the way
forward.
12 Benefit take-up work is
vital, raising people’s
incomes and putting cash
back into local
communities. So why isn’t
money to fund the work
more forthcoming
14 CAB money and benefits
advice can help keep
tenants out of courts and in
their homes.
15 Citizens Advice Bureaux
share their benefit take-up
campaign expertise.
16 Andrew Smith, Secretary of
State for Work and
Pensions tells us how the
Government is addressing
benefit under-claiming.
Serious benefits 3